Tell Me You're Sorry (22 page)

Jenny looked over her “wish list.” The items went from sentimental to practical to just plain silly.

Every morning for the last eight years, she'd had her coffee out of that tacky mug her father had given her. There was a cartoon of a San Francisco cable car on it. She liked the feel of it in her hand, and she liked how the mug always made her think of her dad. The silver platter, the jade clock, and the silver frame were all worth something—and so was her mother's scarab bracelet, another lie she was telling him. But her sentimental attachment to those things far outweighed their monetary value. Still, her captor would only care how much he could get for them. So she wasn't likely to see any of those items again. Nevertheless, she decided to ask for them—especially the bracelet. She'd loved it ever since she was a kid.

The practical side of her wanted the iPod classic, so that she could listen to some music down here. It had over nine hundred songs on it. The Terry Brooks trilogy was 1,200 pages long. It would help the time go by faster in her little prison. She wanted her journals for the same reason. Besides, she hated knowing that creepy man had unlimited access to all her private thoughts for the last several years.

The son of a bitch had been right. It was the longest twenty-four hours she'd ever experienced—even with the naps. Time moved “like molasses in January,” as her mother used to say. He'd been right about the heat, too. Without any ventilation, the bunker became humid and stuffy. Yet for modesty's sake, she still kept herself wrapped in the itchy wool blanket. Jenny couldn't believe she'd been so cold in this place just hours before. How many hours, she wasn't sure.

She would have killed for a clock—or a cool breeze or a Diet Coke or a sandwich. She remembered the smells in the Emeryville Public Market's food court: crepes, coffee, pho, cookies, and cheesesteaks. Her stomach hurt. She had no idea when she'd last eaten. Was it two days ago—or three?

Jenny searched every drawer and every cabinet in the place. Maybe he'd accidentally left some food behind from the last time he'd locked a woman down here. He'd obviously done this before. She just didn't know why. Though the camera was watching, she checked for possible escape routes, too. The trapdoors in the floor were locked, and the big wheel on the door to the bunker didn't budge.

She found a bit of paper sandwiched between the wall and a loose piece of brown plastic baseboard. Jenny pried out the folded paper and opened it up. Her heart sank when she read what was scribbled on it:

Jenny was unsure how her predecessor had hoped to get this note outside. Perhaps by putting it in the trash and praying someone might find it after her captor took out the garbage? She couldn't think of any other way. Tears stung her eyes as she wondered what had happened to this woman imprisoned here at least a year ago.

Jenny began to cry for herself, too.

 

 

She awoke facedown on the brown sofa. She was naked. She heard the humming sounds of a refrigerator and air pouring through a vent. The lights were on.

Sitting up, she rubbed her eyes and managed to focus on the boxes in the aisle between the sofa and the kitchen counter. One was an assortment of snack packs from Costco: Cheetos, chips, Fritos, and pretzels. Another was a plain brown box with “Food Packs” stamped on it. There was a twelve-can-pack of Diet Coke and another of 7Up. There was even a huge eight-pound bag of “Fun-Size” Milky Ways, Three Musketeers, Nestlé Crunch, and 100 Grand bars. On the bed, she saw neat stacks of folded sheets, clothes, and towels. There were even a few paperback books.

“I want you to be comfortable here,” he'd promised.

She found the blanket on the floor—along with the adult diapers she'd been wearing.

Jenny wrapped the blanket around her. She managed to climb off the sofa and stagger to the kitchenette sink. Bracing herself against the counter, she gave the valve a twist. There was a loud yawn, and then water shot out of the faucet. She bowed over the sink and gulped from the stream.

She grabbed the big bag of candy, and bit on one corner to rip it open. She dug out the first thing she could—a Milky Way. She tore it open and devoured it.

The blanket fell off her shoulders, and she was naked for a few moments.

She wouldn't have cared—only as she eagerly unwrapped another candy bar she glanced down and noticed the blood on her thighs.

Horrified, she started to choke on the second candy bar. Bending over the sink, she spit it out. She wanted to cry. But she was so dehydrated no tears came.

She couldn't believe she'd been so eager for him to bring her all these things. She should have known it would all come with a heavy price. If Karla Bowman's note was any indication, this was just the start.

Jenny picked up the blanket, and wrapped it around herself. She hobbled toward the little bathroom. She was hoping the shower worked so she could clean herself up.

But at the last moment, she thought of the list he'd wanted her to compose. She turned and staggered over to the desk. She saw there were two more legal pads and several more pens.

He'd taken away her wish list.

Jenny thought of all the cherished items she'd written down. And she wondered if she'd ever see any of them again.

C
HAPTER
S
EVENTEEN

 

“D
o you know how hard it is for me to get away at the last minute like this?” Jim asked.

“Yes, I know better than anyone else,” Stephanie answered.

He was late. For the last twenty minutes, Stephanie had been waiting for him in the bar at Hotel Lucia. In a black cocktail dress, she sipped her Cabernet at a table for two in the corner. Beside her chair was a Macy's bag.

Standing in front of her, Jim looked handsome in his suit and tie. He also looked slightly annoyed. He kissed her on the cheek. “Sorry, rough day,” he said, sitting down across from her. “You look beautiful.”

The waitress came by, and Jim ordered a martini. When she asked if she should start a tab, Stephanie piped up: “No, thanks, we won't be long. We'll take the check with his drink.”

He waited until the waitress walked away. “So—what's this about?” he asked.

She sipped her wine. “Well, it's been two weeks since you said we should ‘cool it' for a while. I figured if that's your way of breaking up with me, I deserve better. I mean, for over three years now, I've been—for lack of a better word—your
mistress
, and I think if we're—”

“Oh, Jesus Christ,” he grumbled. “Stephanie—”

“I think if we're breaking up,” she continued, “it ought to be face-to-face and over a drink. And it ought to be definite, not this vague, ‘let's take a break' routine.”

“Stephanie, I meant what I said. We both have a lot on our plates right now. I simply think we should give it a rest for a bit. But I don't want to break up with you.”

She slowly shook her head. “No, Jim. I'm breaking up with you.”

He rolled his eyes. “For God's sake, Stephanie . . .”

“I always knew I couldn't really depend on you, and that was okay for a while,” she shrugged, “but not anymore. What's ‘on my plate right now' is that I've lost my family. Somebody tried to kill me—twice. They've set it up so I'm a national disgrace. I still have people writing me every day, telling me what a scumbag I am. You know all this. And yet you pick this time to tell me we should ‘give it a rest for a bit.' That not only makes you a lousy boyfriend. It makes you a coward.”

Jim stared at her with his mouth open. He leaned in to say something, but the waitress arrived with his martini and the check. So he clammed up, gave the woman a fake smile, and nodded. He waited until the waitress moved away from the table. Then he turned to Stephanie again. “I was honest with you from the start about my situation,” he whispered. He reached for his martini glass. “You know how important my daughter and my work are to me—”

“My family and my work are important to me, too,” Stephanie said. “Or at least, they were. You were important to me, too.” She shook her head again. “But I don't want to do this anymore.”

“So—that's it?” he asked.

“There's this,” Stephanie said. She reached down for the Macy's bag, and moved it closer to him. “Here's everything of yours that I could find at my house—a shirt and tie, a couple of T-shirts, toiletries, your
Best of Van Morrison
CD, your copy of
Goodfellas
, and the rubber ball thingy with the face on it that you squeeze when you're stressed out.” She finished off the last of her wine and sighed. “I guess I shouldn't have been surprised. Still, after three years, I thought I would have accumulated more.”

“I can't believe you're doing this,” he grumbled. He drained half of his martini glass. Then he sat back and fingered the top of the Macy's bag. He gazed at its contents. “This is silly. You know you'll change your mind in a couple of weeks—”

“No, I won't,” she said, standing up. She grabbed her purse. “In fact, you can do us both a big favor . . .”

Even though she spoke quietly, a few people at nearby tables were staring. She could tell the attention made Jim uncomfortable as hell. She came up beside him. She stared down at the top of his head—and his wavy, tousled black hair. “When I finally find out whoever killed my sister and her family, and the airline clears me of all these charges, when people suddenly change their minds about me, do us both a favor and don't come asking me to take you back . . .” She patted him on the shoulder, “Because I'm liable to punch you in the face.”

She eyed the bar's exit, and started toward it. “So long, Jim,” she said. And she didn't look back.

 

 

Pulling into her driveway, Stephanie reached up to the sun visor and pressed the button on the garage door opener. While she waited for the door to lift, she wiped her eyes and blew her nose again. On her way home, her cell phone had rung once. It had been him. He'd hung up without leaving a message.

She maneuvered her Lexus into the garage. All the while, she kept thinking how much she wanted to call Rebecca and tell her what she'd done. This would have been at least a ninety-minute conversation, with Rebecca giving her an “Atta girl, I'm proud of you,” at every right moment. They might have even had a few laughs about it. They would have started planning their next visit. “You and the kids haven't been here in almost a year,” she imagined herself saying.

Climbing out of the car, Stephanie thought about getting away for a couple of days this week, maybe to her friends', Erica and Ben's, cabin outside Spokane. She had a standing invitation to use the place whenever she wanted. She knew where they hid the key. They didn't have any Internet or Wi-Fi, and cell phone service was pretty iffy. That meant no nasty e-mails, no calls or hang-ups from Jim—just the woods, a good book, and some DVDs.

As she put the key in the door to the house, she heard something shift behind her. She turned and looked around the garage. Leaning against the wall was a big plastic kiddy pool that CC and Ernie used to play in when they were kids. The thing was filthy with dust. She'd been meaning to get rid of it for years. Right now, it was teetering slightly.

Stephanie couldn't take her eyes off it. “Who's there?” she said.

The kiddy pool stopped wobbling.

She told herself it was just the car coming in that made the big plastic pool flutter a little. Still, she walked over and gave it a tap with her foot to make sure no one was hiding behind it.

The ridge of the plastic pool made a scraping sound on the cement floor.

All of the sudden, the automatic garage door mechanism switched on overhead. Startled, Stephanie clutched a hand over her heart and let out a little laugh. As the big door made its noisy descent, she hurried to the other door—connected to the house—and unlocked it. Stepping inside, she bolted the door behind her. She headed through a little hallway, past the basement stairs, and into the kitchen. She set down her purse and keys on the counter and made a beeline to the wine cabinet. It was definitely a two-glass Cabernet night, maybe even three.

Pouring a glass, Stephanie took it into the living room and sat down in front of her computer. She realized she couldn't use Erica and Ben's cabin this week, not even for a couple of days. How would Ryan Farrell be able to get ahold of her? The poor kid was doing her work for her, trying to identify the fourth young man in the old photograph.

Stephanie had asked Scott's mother if Scott ever mentioned going to a specific country club during his summer visits with Dick Ingalls. Marlene couldn't remember the name of any club. But it seemed like the boys were always golfing or swimming.

Ryan's grandmother thought the Ingallses might have been members at Skokie Country Club in Glencoe. So for the last couple of days, Ryan had been sneaking into the clubhouse and hanging around the pro shop, trying to talk to some of the older employees about the skinny young man in the photograph. So far, all he'd gotten was a polite escort off the grounds—twice.

Meanwhile, Stephanie was getting frustrated—in fact, downright irritated—with Calvin Davis's mother. The kid was a lowlife armed robber with a criminal history since age eleven. He and his worthless buddy had beaten up two of their victims—in front of their families, no less. And here, Mrs. Davis was worried about associating with the likes of
her
.

Sipping her wine, Stephanie checked her e-mail to see if there was something new from Ryan. There was just one e-mail, and the address didn't look familiar. The subject line was blank. She clicked on it:

Stephanie didn't read any more. She quickly deleted it. Then she took another hit of Cabernet. She told herself that if this chauvinist idiot couldn't spell “enough” and didn't know the difference between “you're” and “your,” then the hell with him.

Switching off the computer, she took her wineglass upstairs. She stepped out of her black dress, and then put on a T-shirt and sweatpants. It was warm enough to go barefoot. She was hanging her dress back in the closet when she heard a noise downstairs.

Stephanie froze and listened for a few moments. Nothing.

Still wary, she crept out to the hallway and over to the top of the stairs. She didn't see any movement down on the first floor. She stood there, and after a few seconds, she heard the noise again. It sounded like a floorboard creaking. She told herself it was probably just the house settling—at least, that was what she hoped it was. After another minute or two, all was quiet down there.

“Shit,” she muttered, retreating to the bedroom. Yes, definitely a three-Cabernet night. She took another sip from her glass before ducking into the bathroom. In the mirror she noticed her eyes were bloodshot from crying. She pinned back her hair, then washed her face and patted it dry.

By the time Stephanie headed down the stairs again, her wineglass was almost empty. She went into the kitchen to refill it, but suddenly stopped in her tracks. She heard another noise, a trickling sound this time. She thought it might be the toilet tank upstairs, refilling. But then she remembered she hadn't used the toilet upstairs.

She put down her wineglass and crept over to the basement door. The hinges squeaked as she opened it. She could hear the trickling sound more clearly now. It sounded like the water in the laundry-room sink was on. Or was something leaking down there?

Her basement was one big unfinished room with a bare cement floor, pipes running along the ceiling, a furnace and hot water heater. She didn't have anything down there, except the washer, dryer, and some stuff in boxes.

She switched on the light at the top of the stairs. The steps leading down there were wood plank. She didn't see anything—at least, not yet.

She couldn't help thinking that someone had already tried to kill her twice. Was this some sort of trap to lure her down there? The neighbors were less likely to hear her screams from the basement.

Biting her lip, Stephanie turned around and grabbed her car keys and cell phone. She shoved them into the pocket of her sweatpants. Then she opened the kitchen drawer and pulled out a butcher knife. In her bare feet, she tiptoed back to the top of the stairs. She couldn't hear anything but the water trickling.

The staircase creaked as she took two steps down. She had a better view of the basement now. She spotted a shadow on the wall. It was moving slightly. At first, she couldn't tell what it was. But then she could see the shadow of a rope swaying from one of the pipes along the ceiling. The rope was fashioned into a noose.

For a moment, she couldn't move—or breathe. She realized her death was going to look like a suicide.

Just like her sister, just like Ryan's mother . . .

Clutching the knife in her hand, she half-turned on the rickety staircase and quietly took a step back up, and then another. She kept listening for a sound below—besides the water dribbling. She kept looking down toward the basement.

She watched another shadow—bulkier this time—sweeping across the cement floor. Someone was coming toward the stairs.

Stephanie spun around and ran toward the door to the garage. She almost dropped the knife fumbling with the lock. Behind her, she heard footsteps clamoring up the basement steps.

She flung open the door to the garage and slammed it shut after her. Frantically digging into her sweatpants pocket for the car key, she dropped the knife. It hit the garage floor with a hollow ding—and just missed her bare foot. She clicked on the device to unlock the car. The headlights flashed. Leaving the knife on the floor, she ducked inside the car and quickly locked the doors.

“God, please . . . please,” she whispered, jamming the car key into the ignition. She started up the engine, then hit the automatic door opener. With the mechanics churning above, the garage door started to lift.

Anxiously peering in the rearview mirror, Stephanie shifted into reverse.

The garage door opened only halfway before it stopped. Then it started to descend again.

That was when she saw a man in a ski mask, standing in the doorway to the house. He had one hand on the manual button that operated the big door. The other hand held a gun.

Stephanie pressed down on the horn. The ear-piercing blare echoed within the garage. Beyond the resounding wail, she could hear the neighbors' dogs suddenly barking. She switched on her brights, blinding the man for a few seconds. He shielded his eyes.

She hit the remote again. The big door started to open once more. Stephanie stepped on the gas. The car lurched back, and she heard a loud scraping noise as the edge of the garage door caught on the Lexus's roof. She shot back toward the driveway.